An image monitoring apparatus includes: plural cameras, each of which obtains a plurality of images; a detection unit that detects an area occupied by at least one target candidates from each of the plural images; a storage that stores a first data for recognizing at least one target; a recognizing unit that recognizes the at least one target in each of the areas based on the first data; a camera evaluation unit that obtains evaluation values for respective cameras based on the plural images obtained by the respective cameras; a selection unit that selects one of the cameras based on the evaluation values; and an output unit that outputs a recognition obtained by using one of the plural images obtained by the selected one of the cameras.